RealNetworks Lets You Copy DVDs to Your Hard Drive — And Keep the DRM

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As anyone with a lick of tech knowledge knows, ripping a DVD onto your hard drive is, well, frowned upon by the “Powers that be” in the motion picture industry. Realizing that, RealNetworks has launched a new solution called RealDVD, which lets users copy DVDs onto their hard drives without facing legal troubles. Even better, it only takes about 20 minutes to do so. Sounds great, right? There’s only one catch: it keeps the DRM.

After copying the DVD onto your hard drive, you can’t transfer the movie to a friend’s computer, so you’ll be stuck using your own. Much like iTunes, though, RealDVD lets you authorize five computers to play the movies on the hard drive.

RealNetworks is quick to point out that its RealDVD solution is 100 percent legal and you won’t have any copyright lawyers breathing down your neck once you copy your first movie to the hard drive.

RealDVD sounds ideal for those who want to use their computers as a media server, but with a relatively hefty price tag of $49.99 for your first license ($29.99 as an introductory offer) and $19.99 for the additional four licenses if you want to watch the films on five computers, not everyone will be as excited to rip their movie DVDs as they are about ripping their music CDs onto a computer.